CDs and Macarons

Gasp! Macarons!

Aren't their colours pretty?

I think so!

Did I make them?

I wish I did, but NO! I bought them!

If you had read my earlier posts here and here, you will know I do not have much beginners' luck with these little guys.

But I bought these, not because I have given up hope, but because I was passing by That CD Shop the other day and saw these colourful little guys in their counter right at the most strategic spot beside their entrance. In fact, these were so eye-catching you'd probably see these and some cupcakes first, before your eyes slowly move on to the racks and racks of CDs they sell.

I love That CD Shop. They have superb speakers and a great sound system and just by sitting there listening to the discs they are playing, makes me have the strong urge to buy a couple of CDs. But I have to promptly remind myself that I do not get that same sound effect in my car or at home (yes, I have fallen prey to their "trick" a few times).

So, what's a CD shop doing, selling cupcakes and macarons? Beats me. Diversifying? Maybe. But they do have a cafe at Marina Bay Sands, where they sell these sweet snacks, so they might just want to have them at every of their store, as a by-the-way thing.

To cut my long story short, I was attracted by that blue macaron. That bright blue one which was shouting out to me. So, I ended up buying 7 of them to try - Lemon, Raspberry, Green Tea, Chocolate, Vanilla, Coffee and Earl Grey. The blue one, to my surprise, is Earl Grey. I was expecting Earl Grey to be errmm, grey. But I guess grey does not look eye-catching huh.

Some of them do not look as perfect as other stores' and their sweetness varies, but surprise surprise, they are actually better than what I had expected from a CD shop. But then again, I'm not hard to please, just as long as they are not too sweet and are in nice colours.

A new year, a new start

I must admit that I find it increasingly hard to maintain this blog of mine, especially during the past year (or last year, as I now have to say), when I did not exactly embark on many new baking experiments. I had been baking, but on not on new stuff. I don't think you would have liked to read about me baking the same things over and over and neither do I like to repeat myself over and over, so there goes - long periods of silence.
There were so many times when I know I had gone silent for months, and then I find myself struggling to find something to write to you. So if you are still lurking around, I really thank you.

This is a new year, a brand new start, a brand new round of 365 days all over again. If you have been having a great start so far, good for you! If things are a little not so sweet yet, don't worry, you have many days ahead to sweeten them!

Laugh like you don't have a care in the world.
Give unconditionally.
Be humble.
Keep your spirits up and
Have a good year ahead everyone!

Flowers are not exactly my favourite things, but some once in a while does make you smile don't they? I learnt to make a bouquet and also how to make ribbon roses in 2011. How about you?

Reminder on courtesy on the Net

Today I went for my weekly pilates class at the Community Center.

As I was walking home after the class, I passed by the Cooking Classroom and looked the posters outside the room.

Something stopped me in my track.

There was a poster on a Christmas Log cake class. Then there was a picture of MY logcake. Taken from MY website. WITHOUT my PERMISSION. And the instructor for the class is NOT me.

I was furious.

How can anyone take my picture from my website without asking first? And putting the picture there seems to give the impression that is done by the particular instructor. NO? Unless, there is a disclaimer saying the pictures are just for illustration only, which there is none.

I immediately went to the office to ask the staff how that can happen and I want it to be taken down. I also wanted a reply for this matter.

Some people may think, it's only a silly picture, right.

I'm sorry, NOPE.

While I am flattered that you use my picture (you must have thought it looked nice before deciding to use it I guess?) when you take something that is not yours, you ask permission. Especially so when the poster is showing something that is not done by the instructor, it sounds really wrong to me.

I take time and trouble to bake and decorate my cakes and try to make them as photogenic as I can. I also take the trouble to set my table, take numerous photos and then select the one which I think looks best. So, just taking it and using it without asking is NOT ok.

This asking for permission thingy especially applies on the internet. Not only to pictures, but to articles as well. If you are going to publish the information somewhere or use it for publicity purposes, be sure to ASK or at least cite the sources.

I'm glad I saw the poster today. There are so many logcake pictures on the net, so many community centers around,  and I had to see this particular poster using my picture. I ought to buy lottery today.

Classes and magazine write-up

Since a few months back, I tried my hand at teaching. Baking that is.

I like to try and bake different things, but when it comes to teaching, I thought I had better to stick to what I am better and more familiar at. After all, I don't want the students to come and end up learning nothing or I end up making a flop of everything. That will be a waste of everyone's time. So, I tried a few classes with cake pops and cupcakes, which have been very encouraging!

The first time I taught, I was a little afraid I would be tongue-tied. But that did not happen and I am really glad. I guess what helps is when I bake on my own at home, I am usually talking to myself all the time anyway (in my mind of course). Rather, when I am alone in the kitchen, I imagine I am Rachel Ray, being able to talk and talk and still make everything look effortless (ha! there, you know my dirty little secret of self-indulgence now). So, in the class, I just make those noises in my head come out of my mouth at a higher volume.

I was also afraid that people would bombard me with questions. But so far, I am very glad they have been extremely kind to me. :)

August and September updates

August came and went. Which means my birthday came and went too.

No cake for myself? Nope.

I had made great plans for my own birthday cake actually. I was planning to do a big one. A 2-tier one. A square one, so that I can decorate the 4 sides differently.

I had a lot of sketches in my mind. Full of designs that I had wanted to do. Designs that I had wanted to try but was afraid to. Now was the the time to show the world what I can do, I thought!

When that week came, everything seemed to take its priority.
Ok, actually the everything was excuses. I was also out on most days and that left me with not much time to leave for doing fondant decorations (see, told you I'm really good at giving excuses right?). In the end, I just took that week to relax pretty much and on my birthday itself, had a great feast. And after midnight, that day was just over, like any other day.

Cake Pops feature

So, the surprise was long overdue. But my cake pops were in the newspapers!

There was a feature on cake pops in the Chinese newspapers and my cake pops were in it! And it was a full-page feature! I was expecting only a 1/4 or 1/2 page thingy. Apparently, it's becoming quite the hottest thing (I know, it is already hot in the US since quite some time ago) at present.

This is the teaser on the front page

This is the 25% of the full-page feature. See my cake pops up there? Along with some others.

Can't stand the wide grin of those little yellow guys. They keep making me grin too :)

Sneak peak

A sneak peak into what I have done lately....

Other than buying more ribbons....polka dot ribbons....

I know. People who know me would think "WHAT? POLKA DOTS??"

Right. I don't have a single piece of polka dot clothing or accessory, and pinkish colours aren't really me. But can you resist these ribbons? I'm sure you can't too. They are the nicest and fastest (not to mention easiest haha!) way to dress up a cake.

I also made these little guys for an occasion.

And added hats to 2 of them.

What's the occasion?

Coming soon!



P.S. These are taken with my new 35mm prime lens. I am so happy with it!

Let's take a moment to think about Japan

I'm sure by now the whole world has come to know about what is happening in Japan.

For the past days, for 2 hours after I wake up, I would be glued to the screen of the news channel and anxiously waiting for updates of the situation, hoping that things are better. And each day, there just seems to be more heart-wrenching news and images.

I do not have any family members in Japan who are directly affected. I do have a friend who lives in Tokyo, whom I blogged about some time back. As of the last time I got in touch with her 2 days ago, she is fine and that is a relief. At a time like this, no matter how close or not, you probably would not want anyone you know getting near a disaster area.

I was fortunate to be able to visit Japan last year, around this time of the year. In fact, it was 25 March 2010 to be exact. I was telling my husband that had it been this year, our trip would have been canceled. We were fortunate to have experienced the graciousness of the Japanese people and the beauty of the place. In fact we were very happy to have experienced snow, seeing Mount Fuji clearly and seeing the blooming of the sakura during our short 6 days trip there.

The strength and resilience of the Japanese people were repeated over and over again in newspaper reports on how the rest of the world is impressed with how they are coping. Indeed. I would have freaked out BIG time if I am facing a triple whammy like them now, lest to say stay calm.

It's depressing and very heartbreaking to see images of devastated homes over and over again. My heart goes out to them and with great admiration too, for the rescue workers as well as ground workers trying hard to fix problems at the nuclear plants.

There is little we can do to help them right now except to make a donation so that relief can go to them in the form of food, blankets, first aid and whatever they might need.

Wherever you are in the world, there is some form of channel for you to make your contribution.

I did it through Facebook. This is a cause led by American Red Cross. You can go to this link here.

You can also donate through Google over here.

Whatever religion you are, let's take a moment to say a little prayer for the people of Japan.

Ong Lai Tart (aka Pineapple Tarts) - Huat Ah 2011!

So, Chinese New Year is just over - the last day was yesterday. Wait a minute, why am I always late? I post about christmas after christmas, I post about New Year after New Year and now.....it's just beginning to become so like me to be late for my posts.

Anyway, I had been making making pineapple tarts for friends and relatives. Pineapple tarts are very important, because they signify prosperity. Everyone wishes for great abundance and prosperity in the year to come. For me, other than my waistline (and my hips too haha), I wish I will prosper in all other aspects.

This is how my tarts look like this year and probably will still look like for next year. If you read my post 2 years back on those tarts, you'll see that these tarts look kinda "naked" without the criss-cross strips on top. But what the heck, I'm making them in a much larger quantity this year, so those time-consuming strips have to go!

 

Anyway, just in case you want to relive these tarts at any time of the year, you can always find the recipe here. But remember, eat  only 1 or 2 tarts at one go. According to nutritionists, this is one of the CNY snacks with the highest calories. Be warned! :)

Happy 冬至 and Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to everyone!

I have been really behind in my blogging! I had bought 2 new recipe books at a book sale, but had not had the time try any new recipes since I have been spending more time on some paid orders for the past 2 months. Having worked really hard the past week, today, being Christmas day, is a day to relax and enjoy! I did not even have time to make log cakes this year.

A few days back, we celebrated Dongzhi festival.

According to wikipedia, Dōngzhì Festival or Winter Solstice Festival (冬至; literally "the Arrival of Winter") is one of the most important festivals celebrated by the Chinese and other East Asians on or around December 22 when sunshine is weakest and daylight shortest. According to wisegeek.com, it is also a time to celebrate the end of the harvest, and also to honor ancestors and champion family togetherness.

Traditionally, it was a time for the family to get together (after being away for many months), and the whole family makes the glutinous rice balls together. Today, it is not that significant anymore since our families get together physically or virtually (thanks to communication technologies!). In Singapore, especially when we get almost the same amount of daylight whole year round and we don't harvest crops (except perhaps in Farmville :P), so the real significance of Dongzhi festival doesn't apply to us I guess. 

Still, we follow the tradition of eating glutinous rice balls. Well, it's food! These are balls made of glutinous rice flour. I don't make my own. In fact I prefer the store bought ones which are available all year round and are more chewy. I especially like it when the filling will ooze out the moment you sink your teeth in it.  I always eat it in 3 steps: bite a small bit off, watch the filling ooze out and when I'm done with smiling foolishly at the filling, gobble up the rest of the ball. 

There are 3 flavours, namely black sesame, red bean and peanut. Black sesame is fragrant, but I don't like that after eating them, some sesame will be stuck in my teeth and gives them a black border each and make them look real funny. I don't loathe red bean but my favourite is peanut flavour, although I'm not sure why the brand I buy only makes the peanut ones in pink....which is quite my most dreaded colour. 

Cooking the balls is a breeze. Take them out of the freezer, no need to defrost (yes!), throw them into a pot of boiling water. Add some sugar (I prefer brown) to the water for some flavour. Wait for a few minutes, when they float, they are ready! All these in just 10 minutes.

There is a packet of grated peanut that accompanies the pack. Usually I do not use it and throw it away. This year, I rolled one of my balls in the grated peanut and it becomes a double-dose-peanut mochi ball! Pretty nice!

Hmm....just thinking about that oozing peanut filling has got me wanting for more again. Perhaps I shall go buy a pack again.

Oh yes, if you prefer, you can put the cooked glutinous rice balls into a bowl of warm soy bean milk. Just as nice!

 

Sharing good stuff - Part 1

Facebook. Truth is, I do have a love-hate relationship with it. This post I am writing would usually go into my personal blog, but I want to share how I really discovered the magic of Facebook recently. The real magic.

Facebook, to me, until a few months ago, was a source of entertainment. It's a place where I get to play free games and perhaps fulfill dreams that I might not be able to do so in real life. You see, in Facebook, I am a great businesswoman. I run a cafe, a restaurant, a fashion shop, a chocolate shop and a bakery. Boy, what a  great entrepreneur! Some of my "businesses" have since closed down as I do a "corporate realignment" and decide to only keep my cafe and restaurant (perhaps I realise my true calling is in food!). It is amazing (and amusing) how much time I spend cooking in my virtual cafe and restaurant, while my real life kitchen is spotlessly clean with no cooking done. I shall not go into how I mentally schedule my real life activities around the virtual cooking, because I will not admit that I have an addiction. 

I hate Facebook when it becomes a nuisance. You know, the times when you see people writing utterly useless stuff on their walls or use their walls to brag. There are the brags who write things like "this is going to be a busy week" as if they are afraid people don't know they are busy working. Then there are those who write every single thought every few minutes like "what am I going to eat?". What the heck, who really cares about what you want to eat, how much milk your baby is drinking or how smelly they find the trains are (ultimate snob)? I seriously don't. I have filtered such people out because their constant updating of nonsense takes up my precious screen space and I feel a lot less irritated ever since.

Before you start judging me, the true magic is here. Facebook has changed how the world communicate. There are no boundaries anymore (and perhaps no privacy if you are not careful).

Recently, I discovered an old schoolmate. How I found her was accidental and it went like this: saw my friend comment on this schoolmate's wall -> curious about the comment -> checked out who it is (looking through photos and links in her FB page) -> checked out all her websites -> sent her a message in FB -> waited for an answer -> voila! We are communicating after so many years! Amazing!

The most exciting was, she is now a singer! Singapore has been having more and more home-grown singers  in recent years and I think it is putting us on the globe in a different light. I listened to her songs on her website and I really like them ! I'm not saying this because I know her, but because I really have a preference for jazzy and bossa nova stuff. 

What also made me happy was that she gave up her job to pursue her passion, something that many would not do in the crazy rat-race society we live in. She was thrilled to know that I was also crazy enough to give up my job to become a homebaker! 

This should be indeed uncommon of our schoolmates, since we unfortunately came from one of the top schools in Singapore, where academic results probably rank higher in priority than your life, where crazy students are known to have cried because they attained nine distinctions and not ten, where the principal wished that you leave the school so that you do not pull down the ranking of the school.

Sigh, without dwelling on how much I wish the academic system would change, I shall cut the long story short and share with you her music. I am sharing this not because I want to advertise for her, not because she paid me to, but because I really like the way the songs are sang. And did I mention she sings in French too? Being courageous silly myself, for choosing interest over money, I applaud her decision and courage.

Being a lover of old evergreen and classic songs, this song just blown me away. Belvyn's album is out in major record stores and also available online here

Oh, did I mention that she is also a wedding singer? Now, you know where to get a good one!

What I've been up to

These few weeks, I have not been baking much for myself. I was baking for some orders, but other than that, I did not try any new recipes that I would like to share with you.

In fact, for the past week or so, things seemed to have gone down a little much.

First, there was the much-hated haze, which resulted from burning of forests in Indonesia. That made skies all gray, gloomy and sad for a couple of days. I wonder if London looks like that, since many people say London always look gray? If so, how do Londoners keep their spirits up?

Then, I seem to run out of things to write. I look at my blog and think my photos suck. I try to take new ones and think they suck even more. I almost wanted to hate my camera, but then I know it's me, not it. 

Next, we changed the aircon in our house. It was a much anticipated move since the old one was dying. Especially with the haze, we had to stay indoors and without a working aircon, it was really frustrating. When the old aircon was replaced, there was a little repainting to be done, not to mention lots of cleaning up. Ironically, now that we get really cool air with the new aircon, we had thunderstorms for 2 days and the haze is gone! Not that we are complaining though.

With the haze gone (for good, I hope), my spirits are lifted again! I decided to share with you some sneak peeks of a cake I have done for a website photoshoot.

It was supposed to be for a featured article on a popular website. But I do not know when the article is out, and suddenly, I keep thinking "what if they decide not to feature my cake afterall??"

Here are just glimpses of what I did. I'm pretty happy with it, because I spent a lot of effort on the flowers. In fact, I could not find petal cutters of this size over here, and ordered them from Amazon UK, together with an acrylic cupcake tier stand. But I don't know what's wrong with my hands. The roses that came out just are not as big as I would like them to be. The shipping charges also killed me but I just couldn't get over the excitement of having a DHL man knocking on your door with your parcel. It made me feel important for that few minutes he was there asking for my signature, how silly of me!

Anyway, here are the sneaks on my cake.

Side view

I hope to get bigger roses...so far, these are biggest.

Will shout if the article comes out!

Putting my feet in the soy

I have been neglecting my blog for quite a while. Had wanted to blog on Mid-autumn festival, but it was gone in a flash and I realize I did not have that much to say about my mooncakes anyway since I use a store-bought snowskin premix and store-bought redbean filling. 

But as I was rolling the dough for the snowskin, I was wondering to myself that perhaps all those claimed "homemade" mooncakes are mostly really not that homemade afterall? I mean in these days, how many people would go make their own lotus paste?Another thing that was going in my mind as I was leaning my weight on the rolling pin was a reminder to myself that I will never make mooncakes again. I absolutely hate the oily feeling of shortening on my hands! Years ago I made baked mooncakes and the amount of oil that went into it made me swear not to bake them again. Now I am swearing off snowskin ones too. Next year, I shall just go buy 1 or 2 lotus paste ones from my favourite hotel (yeah, I belong to those "old-fashioned" ones who still prefer lotus paste with yolks compared to all the fancy new flavours which come and go every year). But in any case, here is the nothing-to-shout-about pictures of my mooncake :p

A couple of weeks ago (they would be turning into months if I still did not blog about it), I went for a cooking class. I enjoy going to cooking classes since I only choose those that really interest me and make me feel like it's money worth spending, and usually, I only go for hands-on classes. 

When I saw the description "making your own tofu..." on the Palate Sensations website, I was immediately sold. It has been something I had always wished to learn (and yes...I have a long list...). I looked forward to the class and was happy to know that there were only 3 students that day. Big classes always irritate me in some way or other because usually, because a lot of time is wasted on everything else other than the cooking and teaching. 

We started off with making the tofu. It wasn't that difficult and we had our homemade tofu in no time!

 The tofu alone was bland. So we topped it with seaweed sauce and it was an instant hit!

In the process of making tofu, there are the "remains of the soy beans". We used them to make biscuits and nuggets! Not only are these food healthy, nothing is wasted here!

My favourite of the evening was the Tofu Cheese. Initially I thought we were going to learn to make tofu cheesecake. I was wrong. But this tofu cheese makes a good dip for garlic bread sticks, the okara nuggets and even on its own! The taste is not something I expect to achieve from tofu. It does really tastes a little like cheese and best of all, it was made from organic ingredients. 

Our instructor that night was a chef who is a vegetarian. He did a wonderful job of showing us how these healthy tofu dishes can easily be prepared at home. He also shared with us how he and his vegetarian family prepare their meals and the type of ingredients (mostly organic) they use. My little promise to my own body is that I will include more organic food in my diet gradually, even if it means beginning from just organic salt or flour. Doesn't the indestructible hamburger in the news scare you? It freaked the skin out of me. I know fast food is not good, but not to this extent surely?!

To make printing of recipes easier....

Today, I have added a new button to my recipes site.

I know there are quite a number of visitors who like to check out my recipes there, so to make things easier for myself and you guys, I have added a new "Print Friendly" button below each post (see image below).

Just click on it and you can send it to your printer, save as PDF file, email to someone, or tweet about it. I hope this function is useful to you.

Of course, this is only for My Baking Recipes site and not this one you are looking at right now. I believe you would not want to print out my blog post and incessant ramblings, would you? ;)

Giveway results!

Thank you to all of you, ladies and gentlemen, for all your pie and tarts ideas! And your birthday greetings!

This being my first giveaway, I was so excited to see comments coming in everyday and I have never had so many before in my blog! I even checked the world clock to make sure it was the end of 12 August at every part of the world!

I have to say, there are so many types of pies and tarts that the ignorant me have never heard of. Like grasshopper pie and shoofly pie. This is interesting. When I saw this, I thought this has to be a joke. Grasshopper pie?! What does it contain? Dead grasshoppers??? Surely it must be something that you throw at someone you don't really fancy, right? And where do I even get that many grasshoppers and shooflies? Is shoofly really a type of fly? Google saved the day again...and my ignorance too.  Knowing that even Martha Stewart and Alton Brown do these "insect" pies gave me the peace of mind I needed.

Fruit pies are definitely on the minds of most people! To be honest, I haven't really decided what pie to make. Chocolate and banana combination never goes wrong. I like the tanginess of lemon and lime anything. Peaches sound good too. Rhubarb came up quite a number of times. The thing is, I have never eaten it in my life. I don't even know where we can get rhubarb over here. At the same time, I have a little craving for something savoury, with spinach and bacon...

And then it crossed my mind that I do not have a pie dish! I gave away one but my own Le Crueset is an oval dish. Haha, doesn't matter. I'm happy to receive all your ideas.

And so, congratulations to Katia, who posted the 32nd comment. I've dropped you an email! Hope you have fun making your pecan pie and share with us after it's done!

My first blog giveaway

Hi there! Since my last post on my chicken pie, I was thinking of what other pies I should do. Maybe I should do something savoury? That is not something I do often. Actually, I'm just thinking of what I should do with my Le Crueset baking dish worth about $30. I have one in Cobalt Blue which is my favourite colour of all time, and I'm thinking of what I can do just to use that dish. Maybe I should make Mac n Cheese? Baked rice with fish and lots of cheese? With all the fruits in harvest, perhaps a fruit tart?

Anyway, what I'm going to tell you is happening so timely. I am having my first giveaway! I'm so excited because the good people of CSN stores are going to give a lucky visitor a Le Crueset Pie Dish so that you and me can do our pies together! Moreover, since my birthday is coming up soon, I take this as an opportunity to share my joy with all of you! Isn't this great!

Just drop a comment, perhaps giving me some ideas on what pies or tarts you can think of baking.  After 12 August (which is my birthday!), one reader will be randomly picked for this gift. This is open to US and Canadian readers only, hurry!

Madagascar bourbon vanilla bean paste - Bourbon in there?

I've been silly for so long. For about 2 years?

For these years, ever since I came into contact with real vanilla pods, I came to realise how different the smell is from the artificial vanilla extract we commonly find in bakery supplies stores and supermarkets. And ever since that time, I have been using Lorann's Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla Bean Paste. I've never wanted to go back to the artificial ones though they are soooo much cheaper.

The Lorann's vanilla bean paste, the smell is soooo much more fragrant. It takes so little to give such a good flavour. Best of all, I have the vanilla seeds in there. It never fails to make me happy.

But what I have been silly about is all this while I thought that this was made with bourbon. The bourbon that we add to Coke to make Bourbon Coke?? After all, we are able to make our own vanilla extract with vodka, rum and bourbon, so this has to be the Bourbon Coke bourbon. Right? WRONG!

Today, I have learnt something new. This is not the same bourbon. And Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla Paste does not contain the (alcohol) bourbon.

Bourbon in vanilla language is not the same as bourbon in alcohol talk.

In vanilla world, bourbon refers to the place it comes from. Nothing to do with alcohol at all.

Look this up here. This is just one of the sites you can read about Madagascar bourbon.

And yet when I was asked if my bakes are halal, I said no. I mean they are not certified to be halal, but I said no on the premise that I was thinking that they contain alcohol. Might have lost a few orders, but well. No loss, no gain.

Now hope you learn something new too!

2-tier cream cake

2 weeks ago, I made a 2-tier cake for an order.

A 2-tier cake covered with fresh (whipped non-dairy) cream. For a 21st birthday.

Fresh cream? In humid Singapore? Theoretically, it should work. This was what I had thought, though I have only read and seen people using buttercream or fondant. As the date drew nearer, I started to panic. I wonder why I had even suggested using fresh cream. I googled for hours and never seem to find anyone making 2-tier cakes this way. And it was for a 21st birthday! What if I screw up the poor girl's birthday?? You are only 21 once in your lifetime. Oh right, you will also be 8, 33, 47 once. But 21st birthday is like a big milestone in life. I even had stupid ideas like telling her that my fridge has spoilt at the last minute and I could therefore only make fondant cakes. But no, that would be too cowardly.

Honestly, I never felt so stressed up in any of my previous jobs. The thought of screwing up really gave me big jitters. Real big ones.

The baking of the top tier (a 6") was ok. It was the baking of the bottom tier. The recipe I used was usually for a small batch and has never been multiplied so many times before. It seemed to take forever to bake. And when I finally took it out, it was 1.5 hours later and not good. I really hated to waste ingredients but I couldn't possibly use that for someone who had paid for my cake. So, down the bin went a 10" cake. I baked another one again and thankfully it turned out much better. It was midnight, but I had to wait for the cake to fully cool and give it a crumb coat so that the crumb coat can stay the night in the fridge.

Seriously, I have a love-hate relationship with fresh cream cakes. I love the lightness of the cream and that it is so easy to prepare. But I hate it because my hands are always too warm to work with it. In fact, my hands are often too warm for any icing. I used many methods (placing my hands on ice, on ice-pack, wear fabric gloves (?) ) and still nothing works satisfactorily.

For my earlier Elmo cake which I piped stars all over, it was supposed to be a simple task. But because of my hands, I had to return the cake and whipped cream to the fridge/freezer so often every now and then, the simple task took hours instead.

Thankfully, for this 2-tier cake, there was not much to pipe other than the borders.

The birthday girl liked the cascading roses of my other 2-tier fondant cake. But this being cream, the flowers would slide off the sides. So, I made steps and placed the flowers on the steps instead. On the top, there were a few small piped rosettes. Strawberries were also requested. It was a good thing that strawberries are in season!

I assembled the whole cake at home but brought along extra icing, roses and strawberries just in case they were needed when I reached the place.

The journey there was another heart-pounding time. Usually, when I make deliveries, I would be the driver, so that I can drive as gently and slowly as I want to. That day, I decided to hold on to my cake instead. My driver (aka my husband) is not as gentle a driver as me, and it was at times like this that you realise almost all of Singapore's roads are being dugged up to lay cables and are super bumpy. At first, I lifted up the cake box whenever we go over uneven ground so that the fragile cake would not get so much shock. Eventually, I put down the box only when the car is stationary.

I was very relieved when the cake (and cream) made its way to our destination without any problems. I could not wait to hand over the cake. There was no excitement when the birthday girl saw the cake. That got me a little worried. I always look out for people's first expressions when they receive their orders. But it was only after handing over the cake, that my pruned-up face managed a smile, almost a first in 2 days.

This is my first order for a 2-tier cake and even though I put in a lot of effort, I know this cake has a lot of room for improvement. It was because of the amount of time spent on this cake, that I did not have time to make anything for my father on Father's Day though I had many ideas in my head.

The next night, I received an sms from the birthday girl with many kind words of thanks and appreciation and that she really liked her cake very much. The strawberry cake pops I made were also well received by her guests.

When I saw the sms, I felt so thankful. So thankful for the opportunity and thankful for the trust given to me, that I almost wanted to cry. With every cake made, I learn something new and I get better at some things. This drives me to want to work harder to hone my skills and make much better cakes in future. Meanwhile, I'm hoping to get more cake orders soon.

A piece of sad news

Ten minutes ago, I checked my email and received a comment on my blog. It was from Maria, a fellow blogger. She had dropped by to inform that another fellow blogger, Rosie, had passed away.

Maria and Rosie's blogs were one of the first ones I followed when I started baking. Exactly 2 years ago, they started Sweet & Simple Bakes which organised monthly bakes for whoever wants to join. I diligently joined for some months and always looked forward to what was coming up in the following month. S&SB provided me withe the confidence that I yearned, as a novice baker. Unfortunately, as Rosie was sick months ago, S&SB had stopped its monthly bakes.

Rosie's passing is a real shock and I feel a sense of sadness overcome me. I had not expect myself to feel this sad over someone I had not met face to face, nor actually talk to. But this is the kind of world that we are living now isn't it?

Every day, I make it a point to visit a few blogs in my bookmark list. It is as if I have to be updated on what my "friends" do. I am so familiar with their places in my list that I even hesitated a long time to sort them alphabetically, so that their positions will not change. I have "friends" from all over the world.

Oh, that so-and-so, she has gone for holidays and will be back in 2 weeks.

That lady with 2 kids? She just made a lovely cake for herself the other day!

And the other lady who has not been blogging for some time? I hope her father has recovered now.

It soon started to feel as if I know them personally.

The blogs I follow, these "friends" I made, are all for a reason. They are generous people who share what they know. They share their ideas, their recipes, their experiences to everyone. I salute them for that. There were times when the naughty, selfish devil in me will tell me to keep some secrets to myself, lest others become better at something than me. But I think I will learn very little that way. The world is vast, no matter how good you are, there will always be someone better than you. I look up to these "friends" and try to be like them, to share what I know.

Rosie is one such "friend" to me. If you have not visited her blog before, know her here and here.

Decorated cookies, a cake and cake balls

For the past 2 days, I spent about 4 hours baking, 10 hours decorating, 2 hours packaging (and a couple of hours cleaning and washing up) some 85 cookies that were made for a small boy who was celebrating his 4th birthday.

His mother liked the "Eat Me" cookies that I made and displayed on my site and requested for that design. Other than that, I was at a mental block on what design to do for some square-shaped cookies which she gave me the free-rein to design whatever way I wanted. Oh and by the way, I had no idea that the phrase "Eat Me" is actually part of Alice in Wonderland! When I wrote the words on the cookies, it was just an impromptu idea.

Anyway, I had no clue what would excite a 4-year boy and his friends, whom I presume are about the same age. In the end, I drew a rainbow on each of the cookies. It wasn't a task that could be quickly done as the lines had to be drawn one by one. I was quite pleased with the cheerful colours at the end. I hope they had a great party and I hope they loved the cookies.

Some time back, I made some cake balls for a guy who wanted to surprise his girlfriend (or probably wife). This guy tried to place an order for Valentine's Day but it happened to be Chinese New Year on the same day and I couldn't find the time to do his order, so I had to reject him.

To my pleasant surprise, he tried to place an order again in March, this time for his anniversary. Since I knew it was for his anniversary and it was going to be a surprise, I tried to make it prettier by lining the box with pink paper and tying the box with my nicer and more expensive ribbon. I can't believe that I actually forgot to take a picture of how the box looked like, and I contemplated on whether to blog about it or not because I am not pleased with the pictures I took of the cake balls.

What made me finally decided to blog about it is that this guy wrote back to me that they loved the cake balls. In fact, he wanted to order them again yesterday, but I could not do it because my time was spent on the cookies. What a waste, I wish he would have some party again so that I can make more cake balls for him.

A few weeks ago, I made a birthday cake for a sweet little girl. Her mother initially requested for a sponge cake with chocolate buttercream. After more discussions, she told me her daughter is "a chocolate freak". In the end, I made her a chocolate fudge cake, covered with chocolate ganache made with Varlhona chocolate. It sounds like a lot of chocolate but trust me, it was not overpowering nor too rich. The cake, when refrigerated, tasted like really good and the ganache complemented it perfectly. I decided not to make the cake look complicated, so I only piped the borders and 2 clowns.

Her mother also requested for some cake pops, which I stuck them into styrofoam stands beside the cake.

I always try to imagine my customers having a blast at their parties and I hope whatever I do added to the mood of the occasion. I always cross my fingers that when they open the box, it will be with a pleasant WOW. It really makes me happy to know that people actually like what I do.

Meantime, here are the cake ball pictures that I am not so pleased with, because they were taken at night and I had to use flash instead of natural light.

Hope you are having a great weekend!